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CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: We want to get right back to that overnight breaking story, one American dead, another in a Kuwait hospital. Those two American civilians ambushed in Kuwait and sprayed with automatic weapons fire. Now to Kuwait City. Martin Savidge was the first to get to the scene. He's here to tell us what happened.

MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Carol, there are two things that are going on here in Kuwait at this particular moment. No. 1, surgery for the American that was wounded -- we understand that may take a couple of hours -- and then the manhunt. There is a massive manhunt under way in Kuwait, especially north of Kuwait City where this attack occurred.

It happened at 9:20 in the morning. The two Americans riding in an SUV, it appears from the way things ended up on the scene from what we saw, they were leaving the area of Camp Doha, the largest U.S. military base here. And they came to a four-way intersection with a traffic light. They may have been stopped, according to police, and that's where they were ambushed, and that's the way they are describing it now. Someone apparently lying in wait, maybe more than one gunman, at the side of the road in an area that is treed and where there are bushes, and opened fire.

Police say that they counted at least 24 bullet holes in the SUV. The passenger of that vehicle was killed almost instantaneously, and the driver is the one that was wounded.

Now, as to trying to figure out exactly who may have carried out this attack and why, well, that's part of the big manhunt right now. Attacks of this nature are very rare. These were American civilians, not servicemen. That should be pointed out. But even when U.S. servicemen leave base, which is rare, but when they do, they are dressed in civilian clothing. That was part of the confusion we found on the scene today, because these men were dressed as civilians, which they were apparently contractors working on the nearby base.

Again, one killed, another wounded in surgery, and authorities in Kuwait are very much trying to find whoever carried out the attack -- Carol.

COSTELLO: Martin Savidge reporting live from Kuwait City this morning.

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